I’ll start this week’s
post with a bit of confusion. I looked up the 12 year old Ballantine’s in JimMurray’s 2013 Whisky Bible, and found two products. One called “Aged 12
Years” and scoring 84.5 – “attractive but odd” – and the other called “12 Years
Old” and scoring 87 – “too good for a quirt of soda”. Which one did I have?!
Try as I might
online, I can’t find anything to distinguish them. They all say “aged 12 years”
on the bottle whether tagged that way or as “12 years old”. Why would there be
two 12 year old products anyway?
I’m putting this
down as another failing for Jim Murray’s 2013 Whisky Bible, and if he dunt like
it, he can damn well sort it out and make his self bloody clear. [I’ve since learned
that there is a pure malt - - but you would expect Murray would have made that plain, since after looking
it up online, the pure malt is clearly labelled as such on the bottle, and
would therefore have been included in a different section in Murray’s book. For
the record, there is a 12 year old pure malt in Murray’s book, and that scores
88.5].
Enough. Who cares
anyway? It’s what I think that matters.
The presentation is
along the same lines as the Finest, except this time you get a flimsy blue box
to keep your bottle in. The bottle itself is the same shape as the Finest, but
the intriguing brown tint has been eschewed in favour of clear glass. While the
label is similar, it doesn’t quite have the same class. In spite of all that,
you do get one step up in terms of cap quality.
The day following
another pub crawl in Stockport was not the best time to get a first impression a
blend I consider to be in the next price bracket up from all your various
standards. 41 euros for a litre in Duty Free suggests a price of around £30 for
70cl in the UK. I’m not all that comfortable with spending that much for a
blend, but presumably there must be some that are worth it, and therefore
directly comparable with single malt. That will have to be a study for another
time.
I was surprised to
find I was feeling ropey. I didn’t feel I’d drank that much and I’d remembered to drink two large
beakers of water before I’d gone to sleep. As a result, the opening of the
Ballantine’s 12 represented the only alcoholic drink I would have that
Saturday. That’s unusual.
Evaluation would
always hinge on how I felt the Ballantine’s upgrade compared with the entry
level Finest which I have been
forthcoming about thinking very highly of. That, after all, was what had
inspired me to invest my 41 euros in this in the first place – that and my
decision to try a more expensive blend next time round.
So, as often seems
to be the case, one night of mildly heavy drinking ruined my drinking on the
next night. I actually gave up on my glass halfway through, only finishing it
off after a pause of about an hour, after which I thought I might be ready. No.
There seemed to be
more body and indeed more flavour than its everyday
value cousin, but that didn’t make it immediately better.
It is always better
to open a new bottle on consecutive drinking days though, and that’s what I did
by returning on the Sunday when I felt much better. I was immediately able to
appreciate the 12 year old better as a result and, while I’m still not entirely
sure I’d prefer this over Finest, I
did enjoy the glass very much. I’m starting to think I should treat my whiskies
a bit more cavalierly (should that be a word), and just enjoy them instead of
over-analysing them. Maybe though, this one’s just a bit too expensive to treat
that way – I do have a litre of it mind. That should be plenty.
It is a bit silkier
and, given the right circumstances a hugely enjoyable dram that makes it good
value whether you compare it to its younger brother or not. Nor is it too
snooty to be above being a Saturday afternoon drink.
In terms of 12 year
old blends in general, sadly the only other experience I’ve had was with Dewar’s
(accidentally twice). Nevertheless, I can confidently declare the Ballantine’s
is a lot better than that. Dewar’s was basically a cheap blend with an age
statement on it – it seems a shame for all the spirit to have to be at least 12
years old when you could make a roughly
comparable (even improved) blend with much younger whisky.
I’ve actually come
to enjoy it very much, and I can’t think back now to whether the Finest is actually better. The 12 is no
doubt richer, even silkier… but it’s also more expensive and it comes down to
value once again. I suppose, if I was going to give you a good idea of where we
stand now, I could try to imagine how much I’d be happy to pay for each one.
The Finest, I think, I would happily
pay £15 for (against its more standard price of £20), and the 12 year old… I’d
probably happily pay £20. It may look bad that I’m saying I’d be unwilling to
go up to full price, but there’s all kinds of considerations gone into these
assertions. First, the Finest only
cost me £15 in the first place, and I’ve seen it again for that price in the UK
since. There are also a whole smorgasbord of other blends at around this price
range that I haven’t tried yet, and £20, while it is better than all the other
blends of my experience at that price point and below, is still a bit too much
for a no age statement blend.
As far as the 12
year old is concerned, £30 is just a bit too much for a blend. You’re only a
step or so away from getting a very decent single malt at that point, so you
may as well get a Talisker or a Highland Park, or stump up a few extra pounds
and get an Ardbeg or a Bowmore.
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